


Once Upon a Summer in Jakku

by BatuuPrincess



Series: Damerey Week 2020 [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Grief/Mourning, High School, Modern AU, Smoking, Underage Drinking, mentions of abuse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-25
Updated: 2020-11-14
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:42:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27193282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BatuuPrincess/pseuds/BatuuPrincess
Summary: Every day at the little antique shop called Niima Outpost was exactly the same, not that Rey Smith minded. She craved the routine the shop provided, probably thanks to her less than ideal upbringing.But Rey had her eyes on the prize. A little over a year and she’d be out of here, out of the small town of Jakku and away from the even smaller minded people who lived there. She dreamed of a day when calls of “dumpster girl” wouldn’t follow her everywhere she went. And she was close. All she had to do was keep her head down and her nose clean.Enter Poe Dameron.Poe Dameron, lost and a little broken after his mother’s death, can’t believe he has to spend his senior year in this nothing town. Of course, his grieving father had to choose this summer to have a nervous breakdown and move them cross country to Jakku. Though maybe not all is lost, especially after he meets a mysterious and brooding brunette and her band of friends.When those new friends get him into some hot water, it sends him on a crash course into Rey who must decide what her priorities are, once upon a summer in Jakku.
Relationships: Poe Dameron/Rey
Series: Damerey Week 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1976626
Comments: 44
Kudos: 45





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to Damerey Week 2020! Here is my first entry, working off the prompt modern au (and since she works in a junk shop, there's a hint of wabi-sabi there as well).
> 
> A couple of warnings. Typical of canon, Unkar Plutt sucks in this. He's Rey's guardian and is very much not a nice guy. It is very obvious that Rey is in a bad home situation. 
> 
> Poe is a little lost in this and making some bad (if typical) teenage decisions. Though as usual, I promise it all comes together in the end.

Every day at the little antique shop called Niima Outpost was exactly the same, not that Rey Smith minded. No, she craved the routine, probably thanks to her less than ideal upbringing. 

Each morning Rey woke at 6, washed her face, brushed her teeth, and made her way down the fifteen stairs that separated the apartment from the shop. Since they didn’t open until 9, and Unkar never got out of bed before 10, it left her plenty of time to inventory new stock, rearrange the packed shelves, or tweak the pricing on slow moving inventory long before the first customers showed up.

That strange, slightly musty scent clung to everything here, permeating not only the shop, but the tiny two-bedroom flat above. And probably Rey herself more often than not. But she didn’t mind. To her, it smelled like the only home she’d ever known.

It didn’t even matter that the kids at school mocked her for it, calling her secondhand Rey or junkrat or scavenger as she passed in the halls. She couldn’t blame them for it, not when it was obvious they’d never had to make the choice between a home that smelled like other people’s junk or no home at all. She’d take the former any day of the week.

Plus, at least no one was calling her dumpster girl anymore.

But thankfully she didn’t have to worry about her spiteful classmates or being late for first period (again) or the whispers that followed her through the halls since school was finally out for the summer. Seventy-two days of freedom stretched before her, endless in their possibilities. 

Not that there was a lot of possibility out there for a townie like her, but the new counselor, Mr. Skywalker, had taken an interest in her this year, stuffing her head full of ideas and her backpack full of college pamphlets. According to him, she was smart, damn near top of her class and an athlete to boot. Apparently there were scholarships for girls like her, schools that would pay her way to run track and get good grades. But those applications didn’t come cheap and Unkar wasn’t one to give spending money. Hell, he didn’t give her any money but the absolute minimum wage she was owed by law, claiming that her time in the shop was barely enough to cover the food in her belly and clothes on her back. 

So she’d been quietly picking up odd jobs around town to fill her coffers, ferreting it away under her floorboards for a rainy day. While she didn’t think Plutt would stoop so low as to steal from her, she wasn’t taking any changes. And as long as she was there to open and close the shop Monday through Saturday, he was generally too drunk to care what she did with the rest of her time. Thank god.

So now, she just needed to keep her head down and her nose clean and she’d be out of here in little more than a year. Hence the rules of the summer: no booze, no boys, no bullshit. She had enjoyed all of the above at one time or another - such was the plight of the local wild child - but she couldn’t afford an arrest on her record, or let alone getting knocked up, when she was finally so close to getting out. So no booze, no boys, no bullshit. Not that she was having any trouble avoiding the three. Yet.

Looking down at her new-to-her watch, she learned there was still an hour until opening. Plenty of time to dust the front of the shop and rotate some of the older inventory to more customer-friendly spots.

Though the sign out front said fine antiques, they weren’t fooling anyone. Junk by any other name was still junk. And Unkar Plutt was the king of it.

Dusting as she went, she worked her way to the shelf of vintage coke bottles up front, taking special care with a small snowglobe near the door. Someone had made a mess of Rey’s carefully curated record display, and it was a full ten minutes before she set it to rights and could move on to the action figures. The slightly melted Batman would just not sell, so it was to the back for him, swapped out with a much more appealing Darth Vader.

Everything here had a story, a history, if you were willing to dig enough. If you asked Rey, which no one ever did, it was her favorite part of the business. Finding the treasures among the trash. It probably had something to do with her own mysterious history.

That was one of Rey’s many responsibilities, scavenging garage and estate sales, picking through dumpsters, and - on rare, very bad occasions - even rummaging through donation bins to find the diamonds in the rough. 

Though he’d never admit it, among all the weird and unsavory people who sold to Plutt, Rey was the best of the best. The items she found always sold for top dollar, and she had a real knack for seeing the potential in broken and discarded things. Which, if she thought about it, probably also had something to do with her own checkered past. 

It was two minutes past nine when Rey looked down at her watch again, the newly fixed second hand tick, tick, ticking away. Her heart picked up immediately. If Plutt knew she’d been late opening…

She rushed to the front, the door unlocking with a hearty click. There. Now, he would never know. 

With nothing else to do but wait for her first customers, Rey made her way toward the back of the shop and the little workbench she kept there. It was full of her projects, the things that were too rough or broken to sell. But not for long. 

There was something a little magical about the way she could coax new life out of just about anything, whether it be a decades old toaster that wouldn’t stop shorting out, an ancient record player, or even a vintage bike with a broken chain. There was nothing that she couldn’t fix with a little elbow grease and a whole lot of imagination.

The cheerful ding of the bell above the door drew her attention, forcing her to set aside the cuckoo clock she’d been working on. She was so close to figuring out why the cuckoo didn’t work, she could almost taste it. But duty called.

“Welcome to Niima Outpost,” she said, in her best customer service voice. Even to her own ears it sounded fake. “Let me know if there’s anything I can help you find.”

Mornings were usually a slow go thanks to the sleeping habits of the beach crowd, but it looked like the day trippers were out in full force, a bus full of retirees unloading right across the street.

“Oh, I think we’re just browsing, sugar,” drawled a blue hair, her cover-up impossibly loud among the muted browns and tans of the display. “But I’m sure we’ll let you know.”

Rey rolled her eyes and, deciding the little old ladies were at a low risk of shoplifting, returned to her workspace in the back. This clock wouldn’t fix itself, and the sooner she got it working, the sooner it could fly off the shelf. So she fiddled with a screw in the mechanism, listening to the women chatter back and forth while keeping one eye on the monitor. Just because they didn’t look like the type to shoplift, didn’t mean they wouldn’t. And Plutt would relish the chance to garnish her already meager wages to cover the loss.

But soon enough, the bell tinkled to announce their exit. Stupid daytrippers. Never wanted to do anything more than look.

Rey went back to her work, letting herself get lost in the mechanics of it all. This is where she excelled, taking things apart and figuring out how they ticked, the quiet of the shop the only companion necessary. 

It only took a little more tinkering before the clock was in working shape once more, though she thought she could make it a little more reliable if she could just get at that one screw…

The sound of the bell broke her concentration, Rey gritting her teeth in frustration. Stupid day-trippers here to waste her time, no doubt.

Slapping a decidedly fake smile on her face, she made her way back to the front, calling out her customary greeting. “Welcome to Niima Outpost. Anything I can help you…” but she trailed off when she caught sight of her customer.

Definitely not a day-tripper.

No, the boy who had wandered into the shop was the exact opposite of the earlier blue-hairs, her age, maybe a year older with thick, dark hair that nearly reached his shoulders and even thicker lashes around the warmest brown eyes she’d ever seen. He was gorgeous, and honestly a little dangerous looking; the type of boy who never gave Rey the time of day. The kind she needed to avoid at all costs.

“...with,” she finished, trying to keep her cool. 

But in line with her earlier assessment, he didn’t so much as look up for more than a second, those lovely eyes glancing over her like a piece of furniture as he looked from the records on the counter to the action figures lined up on the next shelf.

“Yeah, thanks,” he grunted, moving on without a second glance. 

Rey sighed. One of these days someone would look at her as more than just the junk girl, another piece of the local scenery. There would be a day when someone somewhere would see her. Just not today. 

Resigned to her fate, Rey went back to her bench. Teenagers were a decidedly more dangerous proposition, but this kid didn’t seem like much of a thief. 

So she paid him no mind, fiddling away until a creak on the stairs alerted her to Plutt’s impending arrival a second before he barked out, “Girl!” from the back room. 

When she didn’t immediately answer, he did it again. “Girl! Where are yesterday’s receipts?”

“They’re under the deposit bag,” she called back. She was acutely aware that Plutt’s voice easily carried through the store. And she hadn’t heard the bell.

“Goddamnit, I can’t find anything in this mess. You’re just as useless as you look. Get your ass back here before I take it out of your pay.”

Rey closed her eyes. One more year. She just had to make it one more year and she’d never have to see Plutt or this stupid town again. At that happy thought, Rey turned, only to find herself face-to-face with the mystery boy. 

He wasn’t looking through her, not anymore, but when Rey saw the look of pity on his face she kind of wished he was.

She held her head high, meeting those honeyed brown eyes. Daring him to say anything.

He had opened his mouth to possibly do just that when the bell tinkled and a new man’s voice rang out. “There you are. Come on, I got the keys. I want to get over there before the staff shows up.”

Okay, they were tourists. With a staff. So, rich tourists. Probably renting one of those fancy houses on the beach side for the summer. A life so far from Rey’s own she had trouble even imagining it.

“Mijo? You coming?”

The boy’s eyes didn’t leave hers as he answered, “Yeah, Dad. Right behind you.”

His father must have only hesitated a second before turning tail and heading back out the door to the cheerful jingle of the bell, completely unseen. And still the boy remained motionless, those eyes offering her something she was in no way ready to accept. 

“Girl!” barked Unkar again, finally coming out of the back. Rey tore her eyes away from the boy. 

Unkar looked just as terrible as always, several days’ stubble dotting his cheeks and double chin, clothes messy and stained and still smelling like yesterday’s beer. The belly that came courtesy of all that beer preceded him out the back, the t-shirt he’d chosen barely covering it.

“What are you doing standing around out here? I said I needed you.”

“There was a…” Rey turned to find empty space where the boy had been standing. Almost like he’d disappeared into thin air. Like she’d imagined him. “Nevermind. Here, let me show you where I put the receipts.”

But as Rey followed Plutt into the back, the cheerful jingle of the bell told her she hadn’t imagined him after all.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Poe arrives in Jakku.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so I was supposed to post this yesterday, but I got super paranoid that I was flooding the tag. And then I was unexpectedly away from my computer all day today... so I'm gonna end up flooding the tag this evening. Sigh. I apologize in advance. Though I'm hoping that this is a "the more fic, the better" type situation? I'll stop babbling now lol. Enjoy a Poe POV.

Poe sulked the entire trip from Yavin to Jakku. All 17 hours. 

He couldn’t believe this was happening to him. Bad enough that his mom had died late last year, but now his dad had decided that staying in Yavin was too painful. So they’d closed up the house, and dropped their entire lives to move to Jakku and run some cottage rental place on the water. Scratch that. Kes had sunk a good portion of his life savings into purchasing said cottages. And right before senior year to boot.

They hadn’t even been gone a full day, and already Poe missed his friends and the house and the quaint little town he’d grown up in. Every good memory Poe had could be found in Yavin, but his dad could only see the bad. And apparently, it was only Kes’s opinion that mattered.

Though even Poe couldn’t deny the fact that the further they got from Yavin, the more life he saw in his father. Since Shara’s death, he’d been a shell of himself, lost and wandering and struggling just to make it through the day. He didn’t get out of bed. He didn’t eat unless forced. He only went to work when Poe drove him himself. 

While Kes fell apart, Poe had been forced to step up, dealing first with the funeral home and the life insurance and the house, and later the bills and the groceries and Kes’s work, all things a 17-year-old had no business managing. He’d been forced to grow up so fast, it was almost laughable that he was still 17. These days, he felt somewhere around 40.

And then out of the blue came the cottages. Apparently, Kes and Shara had spent their honeymoon on the sands of Jakku, a small cottage for a week all they could afford at the time. Lakeview Cottages. The way Kes told it, Jakku was paradise, heaven on Earth, and when he saw that one of the rental places was up for sale, it was like he woke up for the first time in months. 

Suddenly, Poe was the kid again. And as the adult, Kes made the decision to move them unilaterally. One minute, Poe was getting ready for the end of school and the next, he was packing up his room and saying goodbye to his friends.

And he couldn’t even get mad, not when these past few weeks as they prepared to leave had ignited a new purpose in Kes, given him something to focus on besides his own grief. Almost like Poe had his dad back. Almost.

So, he sulked. And gave his dad the silent treatment. Then felt guilty about it. Over and over and over again for 17 hours.

His dad either didn’t notice or chose to ignore the mood, instead chattering away in a one-sided conversation that stretched halfway across the country while Poe watched mountains turn to grassy plains that finally gave way to the gently rolling hills that they were passing currently.

“Last rest stop,” chirped Kes a little too cheerfully. “Gotta pee?”

“I’m fine,” answered Poe, never taking his eyes off the window. Truth be told, he would kill for a smoke right about now, but his dad didn’t exactly know he’d picked up the habit. Poe’s fingers itched to get ahold of the pack hidden in his left pocket.

“Suit yourself. Next stop, Jakku!”

Poe tried not to roll his eyes.

It was 20 minutes until they got off the highway, and another 20 after that before the hills flattened out and the grass turned scrubby and sparse between wide stretches of trees. Next to him, Kes was getting absolutely giddy with each passing moment.

“Hey, you’re gonna wanna see this, Mijo.”

Poe looked up to see more of the same scrubby grass and thick trees. “Um, what am I looking for?”

“Just wait for it.”

So Poe waited. And waited. And waited some more until his dad finally took the car around a bend that revealed a break in the trees and the most pristine stretch of water he’d ever seen.

White sandy beaches surrounded crystalline water that stretched as far as the eye could see. Though he knew it was a lake, it looked for all the world like the ocean as they drove along the edge of a high bluff, taking in the houses and cottages that dotted the edge of the sands. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.

“Which one is ours?” asked Poe, his father smiling as he showed interest in their new home for the first time. The guilt rose up to gnaw at him yet again. His dad was just looking for a fresh start and Poe couldn’t even show the slightest hint of curiosity.

“A little longer.”

They drove on, the large beachfront houses and quaint sandy cottages giving way to weathered retreats, while the sand was slowly replaced with rocks and eroded shores. And still they drove on, through a small downtown populated with tacky souvenir shops and fried food stands to a cute little bungalow with a Jakku Realty sign out front.

“I don’t think I’ll be long in there, but you should take a look around, start getting acquainted with the town.” Kes dug into his wallet and handed Poe a twenty. “Grab yourself a snack or something if you’re hungry.”

“Sure thing,” he said, accepting the money. There was no way in hell he was about to eat a fried twinkie or “the best damn corndog in the land” at 10am, but a quick smoke sounded like heaven itself right now. And he had a strict policy of never turning down a free twenty.

So Poe found himself wandering down what passed for a main drag here, lighting up as soon as his dad stepped into the house. He smoked one cigarette and then another as he passed bait shops and souvenir shops and more than one place that sold crappy tourist shirts declaring things like “I went to Jakku Beach and all I got was this t-shirt!” or “Fun in the Jakku Sun.” There was an arcade that looked straight out of the 90s, complete with PacMan and old scuffed skeeball machines, the ceiling lined with ridiculous blinking lights. Something called Fascination took up an entire building, along with what looked like a bunch of old midway games, stuffed animals hanging from a net.

But there wasn’t a regular store in sight. In fact, unless you needed worms or novelty shot glasses there was nothing here for you. Where did people get their groceries or clothes? This didn’t seem like the kind of place to have a mall nearby. What he wouldn’t give for a Target right about now.

He had made it to the end of the street and was about to turn back when a display from someplace called Niima Outpost caught his eye. 

According to the sign in the window, it was an antique shop, but from the outside looking in it seemed more like a junk shop to him, all jumbled displays and stacks of crap. But there, in the main window, stood the display of old records that had caught Poe’s eye. Enough so that he found himself stubbing out his cigarette and entering the shop to the cheerful tinkle of an overhead bell.

It stunk like every secondhand shop he’d ever been in, that smell that was somehow unique to hand-me-downs and used goods. Or maybe it was just old stuff.

He was working his way over to the old milk crates full of records when an overly cheerful voice rang out.

“Welcome to Niima Outpost. Anything I can help you with?”

Poe glanced up long enough to take in a girl about his age coming toward him, noting the stacks of bracelets that jingled around her wrists and the three weird little buns in a line down the back of her head. Not in the mood to deal with a presumably eccentric local, Poe busied himself with a display of action figures before brushing her off with a “Yeah, thanks.” Thankfully, she took the hint and disappeared without bothering him any further. 

So he wandered around the shop to kill time, looking through a bowl full of old keys and a glass case piled high with ashtrays. There was no rhyme or reason to the store, no theme other than crap people didn’t want. How the hell a place like this stayed in business was anybody’s guess. 

He was looking at a bookcase chock full of old metal lunchboxes, and particularly a vintage Scooby Doo one, when a deep voice coming from somewhere in the shop nearly made him jump out of his skin.

“Girl!” 

Poe found himself following the sound of the voice. Whoever this man was must be talking to the girl who greeted him, and Poe didn’t like his tone.

Again, the man’s voice boomed out. “Girl! Where are yesterday’s receipts?”

Sure enough, it was the girl who answered, “They’re under the deposit bag,” her voice high and tight. Like she was used to trying not to anger the man. 

“Goddamnit, I can’t find anything in this mess. You’re just as useless as you look. Get your ass back here before I take it out of your pay.”

Ok, Poe definitely didn’t like how that sounded. He rounded a wide display of half-broken kites to find the girl standing behind a workbench, her eyes clenched shut. 

When she opened them a second later, Poe was treated to a shock of brilliant hazel, bright even in the dim shop lighting. His stomach did a little flip. She was pretty, and not just in a passing glance kind of way. No, the more you looked at her, the more you found to like. Pert nose, wide mouth, a dusting of freckles across both cheeks, and that wasn’t even taking into account those sparkling eyes, twin orbs that seemed to be daring him to say something, anything, about the way that man spoke to her.

Some long-buried instinct urged Poe to ask if she was ok, to make sure she was safe, and he had opened his mouth to do just that when the tinkling bell and the voice accompanying it stopped him dead.

“There you are,” came his father’s voice from the front of the shop. “Come on, I got the keys. We’ve got a lot of running around to do before the staff shows up.”

The words sank in slowly. Go. He had to go.

“Mijo? You coming?”

But Poe found that he couldn’t look away from the girl. Those eyes were hypnotizing, rooting him to the spot as she held her head high in defiance. Without breaking eye contact he shouted back, “Yeah, Dad. Right behind you.”

The bell tinkled cheerfully once more as his father left the shop. 

He didn’t even know her name, but he wanted to help her. Once again the words were on the tip of his tongue when the unseen man barked at her, “Girl!”

At that, she turned her head, breaking the strange connection and releasing Poe from her thrall. 

Thrall? What the hell was wrong with him? He must have been reading too many fantasy novels.

He only caught a glimpse of the barking man - bald head, stubbly cheeks, huge blossoms of broken blood vessels around his eyes - before he turned and walked toward the entrance. Snatches of their conversation reached his ears, the man - her father? her boss? - continuing to speak to her like she was a dog who’d just pissed on the floor.  _ What trash _ , he thought with a shake of his head.

Still, he paused just before the front door. Just in case the guy decided to do something worse than simply shout at her.

“Nevermind. Here, let me show you where I put the receipts,” she said finally, the voices disappearing into the back. Poe breathed a sigh of relief. That guy had been huge. There was no way he would have picked a fight with him and won.

Looking up, he found his dad on the sidewalk just outside, gesturing to his watch. Right. Time to go. 

He pushed open the door, a small snowglobe catching his eye. It was pretty, a dark base giving way to a scene with what appeared to be the Eiffel Tower in the center. It looked old, heavier than the plastic crap they sold in the souvenir shops. The more he looked at it, the more details he noticed. The pretty edging along the base. The cloudiness of the water. The little intricate details on the tower itself. Maybe that was why it reminded him of the girl. There was more there than at first glance.

Without thinking, he snatched it up. What was one more piece of crap among the hoard? There was no way anyone kept detailed records here or took inventory. They’d never notice, right?

Poe dropped it into the pocket of his cargo shorts before stepping into the golden morning sun.

By the time they got back into the car and headed back for the main stretch of town, Kes was practically vibrating out of his skin in excitement.

“It looks exactly the same,” he said, a note of awe in his voice as he navigated the car through the downtown area. “Just like I remember it.”

Poe looked around, unimpressed. If this is how he remembered it, why the hell would he drag them here? There was nothing endearing about the town except that it looked to be stuck sometime in the 60s. And not one of the fun or nice parts.

But Kes was undeterred, lost in some memories Poe was not privy to. Absently, he wondered what his mom would say about all this. He could almost hear her husky laugh.  _ You boys have one brain cell between you,  _ she’d say with a shake of her head.  _ What would you two do without me? _ Apparently, the answer to that was to move to the town that time forgot.

They spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon running around town - picking up printed brochures, talking to the local travel agent, grabbing a few essentials for the fridge. They even ate at the world famous hotdog stand, though Poe had his doubts about the validity of that corndog claim. But as they were sitting and eating while Kes prattled on about something or other, Poe caught something - or someone - very interesting out of the corner of his eye.

She had her back against the wall of the alley behind them, surrounded by a group of what he assumed were friends. When she spoke, she gestured with a lit cigarette, her wavy, dark brown hair floating around her shoulders. She was short and thin, though not in the way of that shop girl earlier. This girl - no, woman, she was definitely a few years older than Poe - didn’t have that hungry look about her. She was more graceful. Lithe, if he was trying to be poetic about it. 

As if sensing his gaze, she chose that moment to turn, bright green eyes rooting him to the spot. Slowly, so slowly, she brought the cigarette to her mouth, taking a long drag that seemed purely for his benefit. A second later the smoke streamed out of her mouth, her lips poised in a way that conjured images of just where she could wrap them…

“Earth to Poe.”

Poe turned, blinking in confusion at being dragged from his thoughts. Kes waved a hand in front of his face.

“There you are. I was saying we need to head. I have an interview in an hour and I want to be somewhat settled.”

Poe nodded. “Okay, yeah. Just let me…” he turned back to find the woman and her crew laughing, presumably at him. Christ, this day just kept getting better.

They were back in the car when, without warning, Kes pulled off the main road, taking a gravel drive that went straight to the lake. A rundown white house appeared just ahead, a dotting of matching cottages spread across the scrubby green and brown lawn. No, that couldn’t be…

The sign hung crookedly off the front porch, dangling by a single nail. Lakeview Cottages.

Kes’s face practically split with his grin. “Home sweet home.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After some good news, Rey ends up back at square one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my last update of the week, I swear! Sorry for the update spam, but I'm trying to figure out how to juggle 7 WIPs and I wanted to advance some stories before I decide which to focus on based on popularity. 
> 
> A warning: Unkar Plutt continues to be terrible. There is some verbal abuse and he puts his hands on her here (no hitting, but he grabs her).

The rest of the day crawled by. Rey dusted. And rearranged. And fixed. And rearranged again. And it was still only 3pm. 

She had an interview at 4:30 out at the old Lakeview Cottages for a weekend housekeeper job. It didn’t pay great, but the views were gorgeous out there, even if the beach had eroded to nothing. Someone with a weird name had bought the property. Kip? Kem? Kes, that was it. Kes Dameron.

The shop closed promptly at 4, so that gave her half an hour to lock up, change clothes, and walk out to the old Lakeview Cottages. Doable, but it would be tight.

So she set about tallying the receipts and readying the deposit a little early. They hadn’t been busy all day - something Unkar would surely enjoy shouting at her about later - but of course it was 3:55 when a little old lady walked in. Rey gritted her teeth. She knew better than to close up early, but it would have been worth risking Plutt’s wrath had she known this would happen. 

Because of course she was a meanderer, and of course she had to touch each and every fucking piece of crap they sold. Rey must have asked the woman five times if she could help her with anything, receiving a soft, “Oh, no thank you, dear. Just looking,” every time. It was 4:17 by the time she wandered out to catch her bus ( _ day trippers _ , she thought angrily), leaving Rey with enough time to either close up or change. Not both.

With a sigh, she chose the former (and her life). Just once she would have liked to wash the stink of old junk off before meeting someone new. First impressions and all that.

But that wasn’t in the cards as she hopped on her newly refurbished bike - a yard sale find she’d managed to hide from Plutt - and pedaled full tilt toward the bluff side.

Jakku was split into two distinct sections: the beach and the bluff. The beach was reserved for the well-to-dos, the vacation rentals and second homes and weekenders, while the bluff was left for locals and the folks who couldn’t afford the sand. Two guesses where both Rey and the Lakeview Cottages fell in that equation.

It hadn’t always been like this. Back in the day, the whole town was lined in the same, pristine white sand, the beach stretching from one end of Jakku to the other. But a few crappy winters and a whole hell of a lot of erosion had left half the town with nothing but cliffs and rocks and cheap souvenir shops, while the other half flourished. 

At one time, Rey was sure the little group of cottages had been lovely. And with a few fixes - a new sign, maybe a fresh coat of paint - she was sure they would return to their former glory. Or so she hoped. Better clientele were more likely to tip housekeeping.

Though that certainly wasn’t what she said as she spoke with Kes Dameron after rushing into the main office, slightly breathless, with a whole minute to spare.

There was something familiar about Kes Dameron, though Rey couldn’t quite put her finger on it. He was older, at least middle age, with salt and pepper hair he kept cropped close to his head. Handsome, at least for a man old enough to be her father. 

“Wow, you have quite the resume,” he said, looking over her nearly two full pages of job experience, all current. He chuckled. “Are you sure you have time for another job?”

“Of course,” she jumped in, maybe a little too quick. “As you can see, a few of these are more gig-based, like the dog walking and the food delivery, so I make my own hours there. And I have experience cleaning houses over on the beach side.”

His face softened into a smile. “I have a son your age that I can barely get to clean his room, let alone take on what, four, no five, jobs.”

Judging by the way he was looking at her, all soft and imagining his own kid, she could tell she just about had him. Now for the secret weapon. “Well, I’m trying to save for college.”

Sure enough, that smile went wide. “An overachiever! I think we can definitely use you here at Lakeview Cottages.” He launched into a discussion about the pay and the hours - both more than generous - and Rey let herself relax. 

She’d done it. With this on the roster, she should have more than enough for the applications with a little left over as a cushion. Ok, a lot left over as a cushion. Which she’d need if she wanted to eat her first year at college. Or get one of those cutesy matching comforters like all the girls had on the Target ads. For the first time in months, it felt like she could breath. One step closer to leaving Jakku for good. 

Though now was not the time to get cocky. So she forced her to pay attention to her new boss and make small talk. 

“You guys are new in town, right?” Of course she knew the answer to that. There were barely a thousand year round residents and Rey probably knew every one by name and face. But asking about people tended to endear you to them, and Rey could always use all the help she could get.

Naturally, Kes ate it up. “Yep! Just moved here today from Yavin.”

Rey let out a low whistle. “That’s a haul. What made you take the plunge?” Instantly, she knew she’d said something wrong when Kes’s face fell. Rey backpedaled. “I mean, sorry, I didn’t mean to…”

“No, no, it’s fine. My wife passed last year, that’s why we moved. It’s been… difficult on my son and I.”

“I’m so sorry,” she said, meaning every word of it. She couldn’t imagine the pain of losing someone you loved. Mainly, because no one had ever loved her, at least not like that. 

“You couldn’t have known,” he shrugged, this smile a mere fraction of the one from earlier. “We came here on our honeymoon. And I thought that maybe, if we came back here…” he trailed off, a sheepish grin playing across his lips. Rey couldn’t help but think it sounded romantic, like something out of a movie. What must it be like to have parents like this? “Well, nevermind all that. I won’t keep you anymore.” He stood, Rey following suit. “It was lovely to meet you, Rey.”

“Thank you again, Mr. Dameron.”

“Oh it’s my pleasure,” he said in a way that made her believe it. “And I’ll see you on Saturday.”

Rey was still riding that high as she stepped out into the late afternoon sun, still going strong this time of year. She tipped her face toward the sky, letting that warmth wash over her. This was the best part of summer, when the days were long and the weather was warm, not hot, and it felt like just about anything was possible. 

Her phone buzzed in her pocket. 

A reminder. That’s right, she was due at her next job in 10 minutes sharp. Might as well get a move on. 

And as she rode off toward the center of town, she could have sworn she smelled the lingering scent of cigarette smoke following in her wake.

When she let herself into the back door of the shop after a long night of delivering pizzas to rich kids on the beach side, Rey knew that something was wrong. Years of living with Plutt had given her a sixth sense about these things. She had no clue if it was a sound or a smell or that eerie feeling of calm right before a storm came in off the lake, but Rey could always tell when something was about to go down.

As such, she attempted to sneak up the back steps to the apartment before Plutt noticed she was home.

“Girl!” 

Rey closed her eyes and let out a breath. No point in trying to hide now. He knew she was here.

“Yes, Mr. Plutt?” she asked the man who had raised her since age 5. She didn’t remember much before then, but she understood it was a lot of bouncing around before she landed here. 

He was sitting at his desk in the back room surrounded by stacks of paper and other odds and ends that he had yet to enter into stock, the fumes coming off him enough to make her tipsy. Sure enough, a half bottle of the cheapest whiskey money could buy was poking out from behind the piles. Okay, so it was gonna be that kind of conversation. At least she knew where she stood.

“Do you have anything to tell me?”

Rey’s mind instantly went to the wad of cash in her back pocket. Oh, what she wouldn’t give to have that upstairs with the rest under the loose floorboard. But that wasn’t an option at the moment, so playing dumb it was. “Uh, not that I know of?”

A rough chuckle filled her ears, setting off the klaxons in her head. This was headed nowhere good.

Unkar stood to his full height. He didn’t have many good qualities - a weak chin, thin hair (where he had it), pasty skin dotted with blooms of broken capillaries - but he was tall. Like, tall enough to make Rey feel tiny.

“Then how about I show you.” Without warning, he grabbed her arm, his grip punishing as he dragged her through the store.

“Ow, that hurts,” Rey managed to grit out. She hated how weak she sounded, but if he didn’t let go soon, she’d have to wear long sleeves for a week. “Where are we going?”

Her question was answered a second later when he stopped near the front door. “Notice anything missing?” he growled at her.

Rey looked around. She knew every inch of this store, every piece and its place by heart. So her heart sank when she realized what was gone.

Another low chuckle. “Come on, I know you know it.”

“The snowglobe.”

“That’s right, and not just any snowglobe, but the antique eiffel tower from the 1889 French Exposition.” He clicked his tongue. “Could have made a fortune off that. Antiques Roadshow type shit. Too bad I’ll have to settle with taking it out of your pay.”

Rey held her breath. She wasn’t convinced the snowglobe had been that old, and there was no way to authenticate it, but that wouldn’t stop Plutt from punishing her anyway. And she knew better than to interrupt him when he was in one of these moods. 

“$2,000 should cover it.”

Immediately, Rey’s stomach bottomed out. “That’s almost everything I’ll make for the rest of the summer.”

“Should have thought about that before you let someone steal from me!”

“I didn’t!” she yelled back, a little desperate. “There was barely even anyone here.”

Unkar narrowed his eyes at her. “You’re not helping your case, girl.”

Her brain was running over every person she’d seen in the store that day. Blue hairs, day-trippers, someone looking for a toilet. Her mind snagged on the one person she couldn’t have forgotten if she tried. 

The boy. The gorgeous, dangerous boy who witnessed her humiliation at the hands of Plutt and then disappeared. But no, she hadn’t left him alone. Had she?

Not that it mattered. Plutt’s mind was made up. It would come out of her pay no matter what she said now.

“Atta girl. No need to mouth back.” Rey’s skin crawled when he patted her head like a child. “Now, maybe if I’m feeling generous, I’ll give you some extra hours to work it off.”

Rey didn’t have any extra hours to work it off. She’d need at least two more jobs to cover what she’d lost here. The money in her back pocket was burning a hole through her skin. She needed to get it upstairs and under the floor before Plutt took that too.

So she swallowed down the bile that threatened to choke her and said, “Thank you.”

“See? That wasn’t so hard. Now, go to bed. You’ve got a long summer ahead of you.”

She practically ran through the shop and up the back staircase, his throaty chuckle haunting her every step of the way.

It wasn’t until she was in her room with the bolt she’d installed last year slid home that she let herself breathe.

All that she’d done, every plan she’d made, dashed in a single night. She’d been counting on her paychecks from the shop, meager as they were. Every little bit helped.

She fell to her knees, prizing up the floorboard in front of her bed with blunt nails. It was still there, all $573 she’d managed to ferret away so far. She added the $42 in cash tips she’d made that night. Anything that was kept in the bank account Plutt had access to as her legal guardian was forfeit, and she knew it. $615. That was all she had to her name. 

Rey dropped her head into her hands and let out a sob. She was back to square one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> Keep your eyes peeled for a bonus chapter (or two? if you like it?) later in the week!


End file.
